‘A Pair of Polished Gentlemen’, 1801

Description

Mounted hand coloured etching, entitled ‘A Pair of POLISHED Gentlemen.’, designed and etched by James Gillray, and published by H. Humphrey in 1801.

This caricature features the portraits of two well-known dandies, Lumley Skeffington (in a tasselled Hessian) and Montague Mathew (spurred top boot). Both wear fashionable cravats and hats. Their heads project from their boots. Blacking materials, brushes, and bottles are arranged around them along with an “Essay on blacking”.

The caricature was a comment on the gentlemen’s habit of parading up and down St James’s Street in their shining boots.